John Senior

I'm beginning to read John Senior's classics The Death of Christian Culture and The Restoration of Christian Culture. They are both going to be rereleased soon by IHM Press. I am sure I have a lot of sympathy for many of his positions. For instance:

Civilization is not the creation of its outlaws but of men who have worked hard in the sweat of their brows, building on the past – against the outlaws, the immoralists, the advocates of violence and death. In obedience to natural law and by the grace of God, a few good men have stemmed the blooddimmed tide in every generation, though now it seems as if, at last, we were going under.

I also agree with him strongly about the necessity of a well formed imagination. We've been using his list of 1000 good books as a partial reading guide for our home school (although I think there are way too many cowboy books on it!).

I am also sure that I disagree with some of his particular ecclesiastical, liturgical and aesthetic judgments. For instance, he was a friend of Archbishop Lefevre and some other traditionalist for whom I have little sympathy. Also, I am probably not as universally negative about modern high culture or pop culture. For instance, I like a lot of the Beatles music. I think some of it passes the classcial aesthetic test, even if it isn't Mozart.

I'll think more about this as I read.